How to remove this breakfast bench?

[BryonyB]

 

 

 

Hi. Does anyone have experience with removing this type of 30 year old breakfast bench? I’m wondering if it’s easy enough to remove without much (or no?!) damage to the remaining benchtop and wood. I’m not in a position atm to redo much of the kitchen at all, but would love to get rid of this bench. The dining room is tiny and this bench jutting out makes it super squeezy to get around the table. Thanks 🙏 

[Marty_greenshed]

Hi @BryonyB ,

Welcome to the community!

Is there a cupboard under the bench that you could access to see if there are screws underneath?  Usually benchtops are attached from underneath to the base cabinet.. I'm thinking on the other side of the photo you provided is cupboard doors.. So if the base cabinet has some doors that you can open to get to the screws, that would be where you can see it's attached.  Would be a matter of undoing all the screws and pulling the bench top off, hoping no glue has been applied.

Let us know how you go

Cheers

Marty

[BryonyB]

 Hi. Thanks for the quick reply! Here’s a pic of inside the cupboard. Yep, I’m worried about how much glue there might be. Would love for a smooth removal, although could end up with a big mess 🙃

[Marty_greenshed]

G'day @BryonyB ,

Doesn't look to be any glue used, so if you undo the screws pointing upwards into the benchtop... I would hope the benchtop would just lift off.

Keep me updated

Cheers

Marty

[Marty_greenshed]

And also make sure any silicon on the bench to walls has been removed... Been caught out with that before! ;-D

[MitchellMc]

Welcome to the community from me as well, @BryonyB!

I like @Marty_greenshed's way of thinking, as there are almost definitely going to be screws up from underneath. They will also be in those timber brackets.

Can I ask, if you remove this jutting-out section (which is the whole top of the elevated section), what are you going to do for a top? I'm thinking that instead of removing it, you could just trim it down with a fine-toothed saw and then add a timber trim to cover the cut section. That would remove the jutting-out section and still leave you with a top for the elevated section. Or are you wanting to remove the jutting-out section and the whole elevated portion?

Mitchell

[BryonyB]

Hi. Thanks for your reply. I hadn’t considered trimming it back. That might be a good idea. I’ll get my dad to have a look and see what he thinks, and rope him in to help me 👍

[BryonyB]

I did it! Got the urge today, so just went ahead and pulled it off 😁

 

 

[MitchellMc]

It's fantastic to hear you were successful, @BryonyB and many thanks for letting us know. The space appears so much more open now, and I think you've made a great choice.

If you need any further assistance with adding trims or replacing the tiles, please shout out.

Mitchell